The popular vote is a horrible idea! With a popular vote the rural communities, including states are left with whatever the liberal metro areas want...
In order for actual liberty, as designed by our founding fathers, the 17th Amendment needs to be repealed. This would once again allow the state legislatures to appoint senators, returning power back to the state legislatures where it belongs....
The death of the rights of secession and nullification was achieved in 1865, and the final nails were pounded into the Jeffersonian, states' rights coffin in 1913, with the adoption of the income tax, the Federal Reserve, and the Seventeenth Amendment. The income tax declared, essentially, that all earned income is the property of the state, and the state will decide how much income working Americans may keep for themselves by determining the rates of taxation.
The Fed soon became an enormous and menacing tool of political control based in Washington, D.C., with the board of governors. The Seventeenth Amendment, which established the popular election of senators, relieved U.S. senators from the obligations they once had to vote only for legislation that was generally in the interest of the citizens of their states, since they were appointed by state legislatures. After 1913, they were "obligated' mostly to whomever could give them the biggest campaign contributions.
See Here:
Constitutional Futility by Thomas DiLorenzo
The popular vote will be the final nail in the coffin for liberty and the beginning of a new dictatorship!